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Simon Pegg believes the Star Trek movie franchise has stalled because the team has "lost momentum" following the death of Anton Yelchin.
The British actor has played Montgomery 'Scotty' Scott in the relaunched sci-fi franchise since 2009 and last appeared as the Enterprise engineer in Star Trek Beyond, which was released weeks after the death of Yelchin, who played Pavel Chekov, in 2016.
A fourth instalment has been hit by numerous delays, with Noah Hawley and Quentin Tarantino being rumoured to direct the next outing, but a film has yet to be given a green light by executives at movie studio Paramount.
When asked about the delays with the franchise, Pegg, who also co-wrote Star Trek Beyond, explained to GamesRadar+ and Total Film that the shock death of 27-year-old Yelchin has dampened the enthusiasm for more films.
"We've lost momentum. I think losing Anton was a huge blow to our little family, and our enthusiasm to do another one might have been affected by that. So I don't know," he said.
He also blamed the studio for not promoting Star Trek Beyond well enough to coincide with the franchise's 50th anniversary, with him adding, "They didn’t really take advantage of the 50th anniversary. The regimen at the time dropped the ball on the promo of the film."
The 50-year-old also explained that the Star Trek films don't make as much money at the box office as Marvel movies do and so Paramount executives aren't likely to make a profit from them.
"The fact is, Star Trek movies don't make Marvel money. They make maybe $500 million at the most, and to make one now, on the scale they've set themselves, is $200 million. You have to make three times that to make a profit," he explained.